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Introduction

Courtesy of Welch's, Inc.

The average consumer would probably define marketing as a combination of advertising and selling. It actually includes a good deal more. Modern marketing is most simply defined as directing the flow of goods from producers to customers. It encompasses, however, a broad range of activities including product planning, new-product development, organizing the channels by which the product reaches the customer, the actual distribution of products, wholesaling, price setting, advertising and promotion, public relations, product warranties, retailing, financing, and more.

Production Versus Marketing

There was a time, not many decades ago, when marketing was an incidental concern for businesses. The main emphasis was on production. Goods were produced and made available for customers to buy, with a minimum concern for what customers might want. What was on the market at any one time was determined by production managers.

Most businesses now are dominated by an orientation toward marketing, not toward production. This means that firms begin by anticipating what consumers want. They then plan their products accordingly. What is produced is guided by marketing decisions, and marketing managers have more to say about company decisions than production managers. It is estimated that at least half of the cost a consumer pays for a product is accounted for by marketing expenditures.

Micromarketing and Macromarketing

Within the field of economics, two types of marketing have been defined: micromarketing and macromarketing. Micromarketing describes the activities of individual firms, beginning with originating and producing products and ending when the products reach the final user, the customer. Macromarketing, by contrast, describes how the whole system of production and distribution works in a society. The emphasis in this article is on the chief aspects of micromarketing, beginning with product development and continuing through retailing.

Virtually all economies need marketing functions. Even planned economies need to be concerned about directing goods and services to their populations. Nor is marketing confined to profit-making companies or to businesses that manufacture products. Doctors, lawyers, hospitals, colleges, museums, and other service enterprises also engage in marketing. This is especially true in market economies such as the United States in which there is open competition for a customer’s attention.

Markets, Products, and Customers

In the simplest terms, a market is the place where seller meets buyer to exchange products for money. (“Products” include services as well as goods.) Traditional markets still function in many parts of the world. Even in the United States, during summer months, there are farmers’ markets where direct selling and buying take place between producers and consumers. Most service industries still operate at this market level.

Manufacturing industries and most agricultural enterprises are more remote from the consumer. Their products pass through several hands—truckers, warehouse workers, wholesalers, and retailers—before reaching the final consumer.

Products, or commodities, are usually divided into two types: consumer and industrial. (Manufacturers are consumers as well as makers of products.) Consumer goods are those that are sold to final users, the customers. These goods include food, clothing, automobiles, television sets, appliances, and all those things people go to stores to purchase.

Industrial goods are those that are sold to companies or other businesses for use in manufacturing or other purposes. Automobile makers buy many of the parts used to assemble cars. A tire manufacturer buys rubber, synthetic or otherwise, with which to make tires. Eventually these materials will end up in the hands of final users—the owners of the cars. The nature of industrial goods depends on the nature of the goods to be made for final users. The price of industrial goods and raw materials will influence the price of final goods, those that the consumer buys.

Agricultural and manufacturing enterprises are also final customers of some goods. Farmers buy seed, fertilizer, machinery, pesticides, animal feed, and other goods. Factories need machinery, fire protection, meal services, computers, paper and other office supplies, heating and air conditioning, janitorial services, and other goods to keep operating. Service industries also are final customers for many goods. Doctors and dentists need offices, medicines, and equipment. Insurance companies need desks and chairs, adding machines, and computers.

Marketing Research

Marshall Field’s, a department store in Chicago, long used the motto: “Give the lady what she wants.” Finding out what the customer wants is one of the problems marketing research tries to solve. Marketing research has been defined as trying to analyze marketing problems scientifically. It studies people as buyers and sellers, examining their habits, attitudes, preferences, dislikes, and purchasing power. It often studies specific segments of a population, such as teenagers, high-income groups, or senior citizens. Marketing research also investigates distribution systems, pricing, promotion, product design, packaging, brand names, and almost every aspect of the seller-buyer relationship.

Marketing research is divided into a number of subareas. Advertising research attempts to find out the effectiveness of advertising. It also seeks to learn the best media for advertising specific products among outlets such as television, newspapers, radio, magazines, billboards, the Internet, and others. Market analysis tries to identify and measure markets for specific products and to estimate sales potential. Markets may be differentiated by population groups or by geography. Some types of clothing are more likely to sell in Florida and California than in the northern Midwest. Some cosmetics may appeal more to black customers than to white customers. Performance analysis helps a company learn how well it is meeting its goals of sales and profits. Product research covers the whole area of new-product development. Marketing research is an expensive undertaking, and its costs are built into the prices of products.

Product Development

Ibuka Masaru, who cofounded Sony Corporation in Japan, wanted a music player he could carry with him and listen to wherever he went. From that small desire was born the Sony Walkman, a stereo cassette player small enough to be worn on a belt or carried in a pocket. It was introduced in 1979. With a headset smaller than earmuffs, the Walkman could be worn and listened to anywhere.

Not all product development is so easy. Most of today’s products (including many of the basic necessities of food, clothing, and shelter) are the result of creative research and thinking by staffs of people. A new product is one that is new for the company that makes it. A hamburger is not new, but when McDonald’s introduced the Big Mac, it was a new product for that company.

Decisions to make a new product may be the result of technology and scientific discovery. The discovery can be accidental or sought for. The original punch-card data-processing machine, a forerunner of the electronic computer, was devised by Herman Hollerith for use by the Bureau of the Census. Penicillin, by contrast, was an accidental discovery and is now one of the most useful antibiotics. Products today are often the result of extensive marketing research to learn what consumers and retailers want. Ideas for products may come from consumers, salespeople, engineers, competitors, trade associations, advertising agencies, or any number of other sources.

Once a product has been approved, it must be designed, made, tested, revised, and retested. It may be subject to test marketing (sold or given away in a few places) before being put on the market generally. This whole process may take several years.

Package design and brand-name selection are two major aspects of product planning. Packaging not only contains and protects a product but also provides a form of advertising intended to appeal to consumers by its appearance or convenience. Carbonated beverages could be sold in colorless glass jugs, but they are far more appealing and convenient in colorful six-packs of aluminum cans. Packaging also can add significantly to the cost of a product.

The packaging of many products is regulated by governments. In the United States, the federal government requires certain information to be placed on cartons, boxes, and other packaging for products used by consumers. Nutrition information, for instance, is required on most packaged foods. Most packaging today carries a universal product code stamped on it. The code can be read by electronic scanners to speed up the buying process and to automate inventory control.

Nearly every product carries a brand name, often used in conjunction with a company symbol, to identify it for consumers and to aid in advertising. The goal of a company is to build brand loyalty in consumers and to enhance its reputation.

There are two major types of brand names: manufacturer brands and dealer brands. The manufacturer brand is given by the maker of the product, such as Ford Taurus automobiles or Gillette Trac II razor blades. A dealer brand may be given by a middleman or a retail store. Sears, Roebuck and Company, for example, has given the brand name Kenmore to its appliances, though they are not manufactured by Sears. Grocery chains often give brand names to items specially packaged for them. Brand names, like trademarks, can be protected by law.

Setting Prices

Every product on the market has a variety of costs built into it before it is ever put up for sale to a customer. There are costs of production, transportation, storage, advertising, and more. Each of these costs must bring in some profit at each stage: truckers must profit from transporting products, or they would not be in business. Thus, costs also include several layers of profits. The selling price of a product must take all of these costs (and built-in profits) into consideration. The selling price itself consists of a markup over the total of all costs, and it is normally based on a percentage of the total cost.

The markup may be quite high—90 percent of cost—or it may be low. Grocery items in a supermarket usually have a low markup, while mink coats have a very high one. High markups, however, do not in themselves guarantee big profits. Profits come from turnover. If an item has a 50 percent markup and does not sell, there is no profit. But if a cereal has an 8 percent markup and sells very well, there are reasonable profits.

Some pricing is done by producers. Automobile manufacturers set the prices for which they want their cars to sell. Prices may also be set by wholesalers or retailers. Supply and demand also affect prices.

While most pricing is based on cost factors, there are some exceptions. Prestige pricing means setting prices artificially high in order to attract a select clientele. Such pricing attempts to suggest that the quality or style of the product is exceptional or that the item cannot be found elsewhere. Stores along Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills, California; Fifth Avenue in New York City; the Rue St-Honoré in Paris, France; and the Via Condotti in Rome, Italy, use prestige pricing to attract wealthy shoppers.

Leader pricing and bait pricing are the opposites of prestige pricing. Leader pricing means setting low prices on certain items to get people to come into the stores. The products so priced are called loss leaders because little or no profit can be made on them. The profits are made from other products people buy while in the store.

Bait pricing, now generally considered illegal, means setting artificially low prices to attract customers. The store, however, has no intention of selling goods at the bait prices. The point is to get people into the store and persuade them of the inferiority of the low-priced item. Then a higher-priced item is presented as a better alternative.

A common retail tactic is odd-even pricing. If, for example, a television set would ordinarily be priced at $300, the store will set the price at $295 or $299.95 to give the appearance of a lower price. Automobiles and other high-priced products are usually priced in this manner. For some reason $17,995 has more appeal to a potential car customer than $18,000.

Bid pricing is a special kind of price setting. It is often used in the awarding of government contracts. Several companies are asked to submit bids on a job, and normally the lowest bidder wins. A school system may want to buy a large number of computers; several companies are asked to submit prices, and the school district will decide on the best bid—based as well on considerations of quality and service.

Merchandising: Wholesalers

The word middlemen is often used to describe wholesalers, because they operate between the manufacturer and the retailer. They normally do not deal directly with the final customer, though there are some notable exceptions. The most traditional role of wholesalers has been to purchase products from the producer and sell them at a markup to the retailer, who then sells them at a markup to the consumer. This simple definition is almost deceptive because there are so many kinds of wholesalers.

The three basic kinds of middlemen are merchant wholesalers, manufacturers’ sales branches, and agent middlemen. Merchant wholesalers and agent middlemen can be divided into several subgroups.

Merchant Wholesalers

Merchant wholesalers actually own the products they sell. They pay the producers for the goods and take ownership of them, thus relieving the manufacturer of any further responsibility in the selling procedure. The two main categories of merchant wholesalers are full service and limited service. Full-service wholesalers are generally more significant in terms of sales volume. They perform a number of services for their customers, the retailers. They stock inventories, operate warehouses, supply credit, make deliveries, and employ salespeople to help customers. General-merchandise wholesalers carry a wide range of products. Single-line wholesalers carry a limited line of goods, such as coffee, tea, or cigarettes. Specialty wholesalers carry a narrow range of products, such as Mexican foods or exercise equipment.

Limited-service wholesalers handle a variety of specialties. They differ from full-service wholesalers in that they perform fewer functions for their customers. For example, they might not arrange credit or make deliveries. Limited-service wholesalers include cash-and-carry wholesalers, rack jobbers, drop shippers, truck wholesalers, and mail-order wholesalers.

Cash-and-carry wholesalers normally deal with small retail establishments that cannot afford to make large purchases from general-service wholesalers. They deliver the products, and the retailer must pay cash for them.

Rack jobbers deal in nonfood items that are sold in grocery stores. The merchandise is often displayed on wire racks in the stores. Drop shippers arrange for the shipment of goods directly from the manufacturer to the retailer, without ever handling the goods themselves. Truck wholesalers sell and deliver directly from their vehicles, often for cash. Mail-order wholesalers are similar to their retailing counterparts. They sell goods out of catalogs to retailers and industrial customers.

Manufacturers’ Sales Branches

Manufacturers’ sales branches are company-owned business operations located away from the corporate headquarters or its manufacturing units. The Tandy Corporation, for example, operated RadioShack outlets for its computers and other products around the world. IBM had similar establishments. Such outlets display products and arrange for financing and service. Their role as middlemen is obscured by the fact that they deal directly with final consumers.

Agent Middlemen

In contrast to merchant wholesalers, agent middlemen do not purchase the goods they sell. Their purpose is to bring together buyers and sellers, and they make their money as a commission of the sale price. Many agents specialize in specific kinds of products. Terlato Wines International, for example, is a wholesaler for imported wine and liquors. The chief kinds of agent middlemen are brokers, auction houses, commission merchants, sales agents, manufacturers’ agents, and import-export agents.

Probably the most familiar type of broker is the real-estate agent, whose job is to bring together the seller of a house or other building with a buyer. There are also food brokers who specialize in grocery products.

Auction houses provide places for sellers and buyers to come together. Sotheby’s and Christie’s, based in London, England, are two well-known auction houses for the arts. Auctions are also held for other goods, such as tobacco, used cars, and livestock. Internet auction houses, such as eBay, serve as forums where millions of sellers offer a bewildering variety of goods.

Commission merchants are middlemen in the most obvious sense. They take goods shipped to them by sellers and arrange for sale. These agents are most often used for agricultural products. Sales agents are marketing experts who take over the marketing tasks from manufacturers. They sell all of a company’s output and generally have a say in setting prices. They also send back marketing information to manufacturers and thus may play a role in product development.

Manufacturers’ agents, in spite of their title, are really independent (in contrast to a manufacturer’s representative). They work on a commission basis for several, usually noncompeting, companies. The agent is primarily a salesperson and already has a territory and sales contacts. Import-export houses represent manufacturers whose companies are separated geographically from the point of sales. They are basically brokers who simplify the wholesaling and retailing process for foreign or domestic companies, depending on which way the trade is flowing.

Merchandising: Retail Operations

Retailing, or selling to the final consumer, is the aspect of marketing with which most people are familiar. It encompasses every type of final selling, from the door-to-door Avon salesperson to department-store chains. It is the goal toward which all other aspects of marketing are directed.

Most consumer goods are sold in stores, and the word store is related to storage: a place where products are gathered under one roof. Other selling takes place away from stores, as with such retailing as telephone solicitation and direct-mail and Internet selling.

Types of Stores

In the 19th century general stores were found throughout the United States in rural areas, and some continue to exist today. They served farmers in the surrounding area as well as the local community by selling a wide range of goods, including food, clothing, housewares, and farm equipment. Because it was the one place for people to buy their necessities, the store also served as a meeting place.

After the American Civil War, single-line or limited-line stores became common in cities and often in small towns as well. These stores stock either a single kind of merchandise or a small variety. Bakeries and meat markets, for example, are single-line stores. Some single-line stores are specialty stores, such as health-food stores, bookstores, sporting-goods stores, automobile dealerships, and clothing stores. A fresh-produce market, stocking fresh meats, vegetables, fruits, and dairy products, is a limited-line store. A convenience store, such as a 7-Eleven food store or the neighborhood family-owned shop, is a limited-line food store. The disadvantage of these stores is the limited number of products they can carry, and many have been forced out of business by the larger supermarkets.

If a large collection of specialty and limited-line stores is brought together into one building under a single ownership, the result is a department store. These are large multistoried buildings in which customers may find nearly every product on the market today. There are full lines of clothing, shoes, appliances, jewelry, sporting goods, books, cosmetics, furniture, art works, china, silverware, selected food products, and much more.

Establishments similar to modern department stores existed in Japan as early as the 17th century. They appeared in the United States when central business districts developed in large cities. In the 1920s central-city department stores began establishing branches in suburbs. Today most branches are located in shopping malls. Some department stores, such as Sears and J.C. Penney Company, have become international chains, though neither originated as a department store. (Sears began as a mail-order house, and J.C. Penney was a dry-goods store.)

Mass merchandisers such as Kmart, Target, and Wal-Mart are similar to department stores in arrangement of goods and are comparable to the old “five-and-dime” stores such as those of F.W. Woolworth Company and S.S. Kresge. They are normally chain enterprises. They are self-service stores with checkout counters similar to grocery supermarkets. They offer a low markup price and depend on high turnover of goods for their profits.

The supermarket is a mass merchandiser of food and related products. Some supermarkets incorporate departments for drugs, hardware, appliances, liquor, and other products as well. Supermarkets are self-service stores with checkout counters. Their customers are people who come once a week or less and stock up on many goods. As stores became more competitive, supermarkets began incorporating specialty shops, such as small bakeries and delicatessens, into their stores. A variation on the supermarket is the box store, which sells products directly out of cartons. By reducing overhead, a box store can keep its prices lower than those of regular supermarkets.

Discount houses, often specializing in appliances and electronics, emerged after World War II in the United States. They carry large inventories and sell their products at lower prices than those asked by other retail outlets. Some are called closed-door discount houses because they sell only to certain groups, such as labor-union members or government employees. The success of discount houses has depended on the nullification of so-called fair-trade laws, which once required retailers to sell at prices set by manufacturers. Outlet stores, such as factory outlets, department-store outlets, and catalog outlets, sell merchandise at prices that are 20 to 60 percent lower than goods at regular retail stores.

Nonstore Selling

There are at least six means of selling without the need for stores: catalog sales, direct mail, door-to-door selling, the use of vending machines, telemarketing, and selling over the Internet. Mail-order buying from catalogs was long a popular way to shop. Spiegel Incorporated, in the United States, did much of its business as a mail-order house, as did Sears and J.C. Penney. Many department stores also offered catalogs to their customers. Increasingly, however, customers buy such goods through the Internet rather than through the mail. Catalog showroom retailers display catalog merchandise in large retail outlets.

Direct-mail selling is similar to catalog retailing. To purchase goods from a catalog, a buyer may go to the retailer to place an order. In direct-mail selling the approach to the customer is by mail, and orders are placed by mail, telephone, or computer. The customer may be mailed a catalog, or the seller may just send a few brochures offering specific items. The customer mails a response card or, to save time, may telephone. Many firms, including the bank-card systems and oil companies, regularly send direct-mail solicitations to their customers.

Door-to-door selling is less common than it once was. Party-plan selling is similar to door-to-door retailing. A homeowner invites friends to listen to a sales pitch, merchandise is displayed, and orders are taken. This type of selling is done by such companies as Tupperware and Mary Kay Cosmetics.

Vending machines have been in use in Europe since the mid-19th century to sell candy and tobacco products. Their practical use in the United States began in 1888, when coin-activated machines were used to expand the sales of chewing gum.

Refrigeration was added to vending machines in the 1930s in order to sell ice cream and soft drinks. Vending-machine operations are usually done on sites owned by other businesses. They are especially common in schools and workplaces as purveyors of food, coffee, and soft drinks.

Telemarketing literally means “selling from a distance.” It includes telephone solicitation and buying by means of television and computers. Telephone solicitation is frequently done to offer credit cards, to ask for newspaper subscriptions, and to sell vacation or retirement property.

Home shopping by means of television and computers is another development in marketing. Television viewers can see goods they may want to purchase and order them by telephone or computer. Purchases are made by credit card. By accessing a company’s Web page, customers may view images of products, compare product features and prices, and place an order. Internet auction sites are another popular way of buying and selling merchandise. (See alsocooperatives; credit; franchise.)

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